Way to go - the latest sat-navs

If you think it's scary getting directions from your wife, just wait until Brian Blessed and Darth Vader boom out commands from your sat-nav...

Of the top of the range sat-navs, the TomTom G0750 Live did the best at navigating

1. TOMTOM GO750 LIVE

£250, tomtom.com

Maps 45 European countries

Screen 4.3in

Of the top-of-the-range sat-navs, this did the best at navigating. It quickly found and held its GPS satellite signal, wasn't fazed by route changes and its screen was easy to read. And from October, TomTom users can download Brian Blessed's voice - hear the device boom out, 'Drive, Hawkmen, drive!'

5/5

The nuLink! service makes the Garmin Nuvi 1690 the first social networking sat-nav

2. GARMIN NUVI 1690

£280, garmin.co.uk

Maps43 countries (including Europe)

Screen 4.3in widescreen

The nuLink! service makes the 1690 the first social networking sat-nav. As well as letting you track friends and family, it provides local business search, traffic updates and lots of other info. The catch? It's £70 a year for stuff that's often free in similarly priced systems.

3/5

The Mio Navman 470 comes with two years of map updates

3. MIO NAVMAN 470

£100, halfords.com

Maps UK/Ireland

Screen 4.3in widescreen

The 470 comes with two years of map updates. And you'll need them - the onboard map (before updates) routed the wrong way down a one-way and through a pedestrianised zone. There's also some very odd intonation going on with the default voice. On the plus side, the screen was clear.

3/5

The Garmin Nuvi 3790T features a bright, responsive multi-touch screen and a huge list of extras

4. GARMIN NUVI 3790T

£330, garmin.co.uk

Maps 44 European countries

Screen 4.3in widescreen

Features a bright, responsive multi-touch screen and a huge list of extras. But it took ages to get a decent GPS signal, changed routes incredibly slowly after a detour and the voice-command speech-recognition technology found most accents unintelligible.

4/5

The good voice feedback made the Navigon1410 easy to use on the road

5. NAVIGON1410

£130, navigon.com

Maps 20 European countries

Screen 3.5in

A superb sat-nav. Clear on-screen action and good voice feedback made it easy to use on the road, and it tracked satellites and replotted routes quickly and smartly. The lack of key features does hurt though, with no traffic updates and no Bluetooth wireless hands-free phoning.

4/5

The TomTom Start2's tiny shape seems shrunken against the others

6. TOMTOM START2

£120, tomtom.com

Maps UK/Ireland

Screen 3.5

The entry-level Start2's tiny shape seems shrunken against the others. Yet despite the low price, the GPS tracking was accurate and route guidance fine - but confused by sudden detours. Meanwhile, geeks across the world have made Darth Vader's voice one of TomTom's bestselling downloads.

4/5

Cost-cutting corners with the Navigon 70 Premium include no free TMC traffic updates

7. NAVIGON 70 PREMIUM

£260, navigon.com

Maps 43 European countries

Screen 5in widescreen

Rival to Garmin's 3790T. The Premium shares its rival's rubbish voice command and sluggish route recalculation, as well as features like Bluetooth hands-free and MicroSD card slot expandability. Costcutting corners taken include no free TMC traffic updates.

3/5

The Binatone G500 comes across as a rival to the premium sat-navs, but at a budget price

8. BINATONE G500

£120, argos.co.uk

Maps 21 European countries

Screen 5in widescreen

This comes across as a rival to the premium sat-navs, but at a budget price. Of course, there are a few catches. The large touch-screen looks great until you try to use it in bright light, and there's no Bluetooth or voice control. The fast GPS signal's a good base though.